Waynesville, MO
Waynesville wildfire risk explained
USFS scores Waynesville at the 72nd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (well above the national norm for wildfire risk), a figure built from 2,315 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Waynesville at the 74th national percentile — 2 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Waynesville's buildings actually sit
USFS classifies 57.8% of Waynesville's buildings as Direct exposure, higher than its 42.2% Indirect share and far above its 0% Minimal share — a profile where 1,338 structures sit close enough to vegetation that lot clearing matters most.
Where Waynesville ranks
Waynesville scores 72nd nationally and 86th within Missouri — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Waynesville ranks 8,730 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 6,669 by building count (1 is largest). Within Missouri alone, it ranks 149 of 1,062 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Missouri on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Waynesville
Waynesville's 72nd-percentile, high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Waynesville's 57.8% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
Where Waynesville's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Waynesville's 8,730-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Waynesville's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.